File-HStore is a very minimalist perl library to store files on a filesystem using a very simple hash-based storage.

File-HStore is nothing more than a simple wrapper interface to a storage containing a specific directory structure where files are hold based on their hashes. The name of the directories is based on the first two bytes of the hexadecimal form of the digest. The file is stored and named with its full hexadecimal form in the corresponding prefixed directory.

The current version is supporting the SHA-1 and SHA-2 (256 bits) algorithm. The FAT (Free Archive Toolkit) format is also supported and it is composed of the date of submission plus the SHA-2 real digest part.

This constructor returns a new File::HFile object encapsulating a specific store. The path specifies where the HStore is located on the filesystem. If the path is not specified, the path ~/.hstore is used. The digest specifies the algorithm to be used (SHA-1 or SHA-2 or the submission date called FAT). If not specified, SHA-1 is used. Various digest can be mixed in the same path but the utility is somewhat limited. The $prefix is only an extension used for the FAT (Free Archive Format) format to specify the archive unique name.

Please also consider the security impact in your application concerning the statement made by the NIST regarding the overall security impact of the SHA-1 vulnereability. In the use of storage and unique identifier only , the impact is somewhat very limited.

This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself, either Perl version 5.8.5 or, at your option, any later version of Perl 5 you may have available.